1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to automotive vehicles that are powered by internal combustion engines and that have electrical systems containing storage batteries.
2. Background Information
Lead-acid storage batteries are commonly used in electrical systems of automotive vehicles to provide electric energy for operating starter motors to crank engines that power the vehicles. During running of an engine, an alternator that is driven by the engine keeps the battery recharged through an electric regulator. It is generally desirable for the battery to be disposed in proximity to the engine so that ohmic losses can be minimized during cranking when current draw on the battery is quite high. Over time, such a battery ages, and eventually reaches a point where it is incapable of sustaining sufficient charge to serve the needs of a vehicle.
Heat is a contributor to battery aging, and because an engine in an engine compartment can at times be a source of significant heat, various arrangements have heretofore been proposed to shield the battery from engine heat. It is believed that the following U.S. patents are representative of the state of the art relating to thermal protection of a storage battery in an engine compartment: U.S. Pat. No. 4,126,734; U.S. Pat. No. 4,976,327; U.S. Pat. No. 5,031,712; U.S. Pat. No. 5,082,075; U.S. Pat. No. 5,215,834; U.S. Pat. No. 5,320,190; and U.S. Pat. No. 5,542,489. The inventor's pending U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/348,928, of even date, bearing title STORAGE BATTERY PROTECTION BY ENGINE AIR INTAKE SYSTEM discloses further improvements in thermal protection of a battery using intake air for active cooling of the battery.
Because an engine vibrates to some degree when it is running, it is also known to mount the engine on a vehicle chassis through engine mounts containing elastomeric elements that isolate the chassis at least to some degree from vibrations propagating from the engine. A known design practice for associating an engine air intake system with an engine is to dispose an air box that contains an air filter element on the engine. Noise and vibration generated by the intake airflow will therefore also be inherently isolated from the chassis at least to some degree by virtue of the engine mounts.
If an air box could be mounted on other than an engine, more packaging options would be available for the design of an engine compartment, but the isolation that is obtained through the engine mounts would be lost. Accordingly, it would seem that the mounting an air box on body and/or chassis members of a vehicle would require the use of devoted vibration isolators to provide at least some degree of isolation of the air intake system noise and vibration from the chassis and body of the vehicle. Like engine noise and vibration, air intake system noise and vibration may contribute in a negative way to NVH (noise, vibration, harshness) characteristics of a vehicle.
It is therefore believed desirable if an air box could be mounted on body and/or chassis structure proximate an engine in an engine compartment so that objectionable noise and vibration frequencies created by airflow through the engine air intake system could be isolated from transmission through the air box to the body and/or chassis structure without the use of devoted vibration isolators.